Letters
by SugaredPoison
Summary: It was over. Finally, after all the years of fighting the endless battle, it was over. At least, for Harry Potter, it was. For the rest of the world, it may never end...One-shot alternate ending to the HP series


**Disclaimer: 'Letters' is a one-shot 'Harry Potter' fanfic, and is not meant to be an exact replica of the original series. All characters were created by, and are property of, J.K. Rowling, author of the original 'Harry Potter' series. I claim no rights to any persons, places, or spells depicted in this story that were originally penned by Mrs. Rowling.**

* * *

It was over.

Finally, after all the years of fighting the endless battle, it was over.

At least, for Harry Potter, it was.

For the rest of the world, it may never end...

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_Dear Ron,_

_Sorry it's been so long since I wrote last, but Hedwig took forever to deliver a post to Hagrid. I'm beginning to think the poor girl is getting too old for these trips, but she's my only means of communication with you lot while I'm stuck in this place._

_Not much has happened out of the ordinary here, except that my scar hurts all the time. But, hey, I guess it's to be expected, isn't it?_

_Hope all is well for you, and I hope to hear from you soon, though I don't really expect to._

_See ya,_

_Harry_

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The sun shone dimly through the bars as Hedwig rustled her wings, hooting softly. Faithful Hedwig, her snowy white feathers beginning to fall out and her flesh clinging to her bones almost painfully from lack of proper nourishment, waited patiently for Harry's trembling hands to finish tying the red-spotted parchment to her leg.

"Be safe," Harry muttered, as he always did before sending his beloved owl on her way these days, stroking her feathers gently.

A painful knot formed in the pit of his stomach as he watched her fly off, and he felt his hands ball into fists of anxiety. Harry held his breath, releasing it slowly only after Hedwig disappeared safely in the distance.

It was a great risk, to both Harry and his pet, to write these letters he'd written every day. But the deliveries meant that Hedwig would not be there with him, where it was no longer safe. The more time she spent as far away from Harry as possible, the better. The most dangerous part, though, came when she departed, and again when she returned, the chance of her being spotted by someone the greatest fear that Harry had.

If it was ever discovered that Harry was sending out posts, the consequences would be too horrible to imagine.

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_Dear Hermione,_

_Do you know what I was just thinking about? That time in second year when you, me, and Ron took the polyjuice potion, and you turned into a cat. I know it was awful at the time, but surely it's worth a good laugh now, isn't it? The image of you with fuzzy ears and a tail...Ha, ha!_

_Anyway, it brought a smile to my face, at least for a couple of minutes._

_Miss you much,_

_Harry_

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A fly buzzed around the forgotten bread on the tarnished plate in the corner, but Harry ignored it, lying on his back on the hard, uncomfortable bed. Staring at the ceiling, he was going through what had become his regular nightly ritual, trying desperately to clear his mind of the events of the evening so that he could possibly get an hour or two of sleep.

It was becoming slightly easier, pushing the fear and physical pain from his mind every night, after nearly three months within the same four walls with their one tiny, barred window. Oh, there were nights when the torment never stopped, nights where he saw the sun rise in the horizon as he attempted to block out the heated agony radiating from the wounds on his back, his arms, his legs. But most of the time, he was left on his own, to make another desperate attempt at finding rest.

Harry closed his eyes, his lips barely moving as he whispered a silent prayer. He prayed for self, he prayed for sanity...but most of all, he prayed for sleep.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

_Dear Lupin,_

_I had a dream the other night about that time when we were in your office, drinking tea and chatting about dementors. You remember, don't you? That was when old Snape brought you the Wolfsbane potion, and you told me that you were under the weather, and the potion was the only thing that made you feel better. I never really wondered until just now why you didn't feel you could trust me enough to tell me the truth at the time, seeing as my dad was one of your best mates, and all._

_Wouldn't have bothered me. Just thought I'd let you know that._

_See ya,_

_Harry_

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Time is a fickle thing. It can seem so short when you're caught up in the midst of things, yet so long when you're isolated from it all. Or, sometimes, it can cease to exist at all.

Days turned into weeks, weeks into months, and months into years, but to Harry, it all seemed like nothing more than a few grains in the sand of an hourglass. He had no idea how long it had been since he'd been brought to the little room, with no way to tell time besides trying to count the nightfalls and seasons as they changed. Without a mirror to look into, Harry could not see the deep lines that etched his face, or the gray hairs that were beginning to fleck the jet black, still untidy mop on his head. Though he knew he was still quite young, he had lost track of his birthdays, and no longer had any idea just how old he was.

Throughout the entire time, Harry never received any sort of communication from his dearest friends. Yet, faithfully, everyday he sent Hedwig (now sporting bald patches on her chest and the back of her head, her movements slow and painful with age; but still faithful, ever faithful, to her beloved owner) with the letters to those he longed so much to see again, and everyday she returned to him with no reply.

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_Dear Dumbledore,_

_It's become difficult to write lately, as I've noticed my hands seem to have changed. They ache constantly, and my fingers seem stuck in some odd claw-like form. Not to mention, Hedwig's feathers are a bit of a poor substitute for a real quill, and, well, let's just say I could do with a better ink, as well._

_I'm complaining again, I know it. It seems like whenever I write, I'm complaining about something. It's just that I miss those days when I could come to you with my worst problems, and you always helped me to find a way to work them out._

_I'm starting to believe all the thinking in the world couldn't work out what's happening now._

_I don't really know why I'm telling you this now, after all the chances I had back in school, but I'd come to think of you, over the years, as a sort of guardian. But always. from the beginning, I've thought of you as a friend._

_I hope to see you soon._

_Lots of love,_

_Harry_

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The silence of the night was disturbed by the soft sound of worn-out wings as Hedwig fluttered down to land. She hooted weakly as her wide, amber eyes scanned the area around her, checking for onlookers.

There would be no one, there never was. Everyday for nearly fourteen years, sometimes two or three times in one day, she came to the same place, delivering the messages that her beloved owner sent, the letters that Harry had been so desperate to write that he used the feathers she'd lost on the tiny platform that held the bars to his window as quills, and blood drawn from his own fingertips as ink.

Nearly fourteen years, and never once had Hedwig seen a living soul there.

At first, when there had been no one to remove the bloody parchments from her leg, and she'd returned to Harry not only with no reply, but with the letter never even opened, it had been both confusing for him and painful for her. She hated to hear him questioning his dearest friends' loyalty out loud as he removed the unanswered letters and promptly tore them into tiny bits that he shoved through a thin crack in the floor. It wasn't long before Hedwig figured out a way to use her beak to untie the threads, and let him convince himself that the others were finally accepting his communications.

It hurt the aged owl almost as badly to know that no matter how faithful Harry was to the hope that someday, somebody would take the time to write back, it would never happen. Still, it was a disquieting comfort to Hedwig that, as an owl, she was physically incapable of telling Harry the truth.

If she'd been able to, she wasn't all that sure that she'd be able to withstand witnessing the agonizing heartache that would surely come with his learning all that had happened that horrid night...

It had been a storm like no other, a storm of evil rather than rain. The Fidelius Charm broken after days of torture at the hands of Bellatrix Lestrange brought Mundungus Fletcher to the brink of insanity, the headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix was raided only moments after Harry had been locked for the first time in the tiny room that became his home. Alastor "Mad-Eye" Moody had barely a moment to warn the others what was about to happen before the first of many Killing Curses had been cast, striking the former Auror dead so suddenly that his magical eye popped out and rolled away across the floor.

Kingsley Shacklebolt, running up the stairs from the kitchen at the sound of Moody's cut-of shout, never reached the landing. Nymphadora Tonks, trying desperately to call for help, was silenced before Arthur Weasley's head appeared in the fire. Remus Lupin, his arm swinging around to take aim with his wand, fell to the floor before the incantation even reached his lips.

The entire Weasley family, gone as well. The twins, Fred and George, were happily closing down their joke shop for the day, when the building exploded in a burst of flames. Arthur, Molly, and Ginny, enjoying a peaceful family dinner, simultaneously looked up when Tonks' head appeared briefly, frantically, in their fireplace, moments before the magic that held the Burrow standing was removed, and the entire house came crashing down over them. Bill, pulling later hours than usual at Gringott's Wizard Bank, was found the next morning, keeled over at his desk with the shiny, silver blade of a letter opener buried deep in his back. Percy, forced to bear witness to the torture and murder of Cornelius Fudge, the Minister of Magic and his boss for nearly five years, could stand no more, and begged the Death Eaters to grant him the mercy of a quick death. Having had their fun at Fudge's expense, they readily agreed, and ended his life with a burst of green light.

Even Charlie, though a good distance seperated him from his family, met his end when one of the many Norwegian Ridgeback dragons that he worked with set him ablaze in a fatal show of bad temperament.

Ron and Hermione, having just left a party to celebrate the second birthday of a friend of their son, RJ, returned home to find hooded visitors waiting in their kitchen. Flashes of green light filled the small house, and the family never celebrated anything again.

Neville Longbottom, a newly appointed Healer at St. Mungo's, bravely met his demise while trying to protect the children of the ward on which he worked. Luna Lovegood, having taken over her father's position as editor of The Quibbler after his retirement at the end of her seventh year at Hogwarts, died when a bewitched, life-sized drawing of the mythical Crumple-Horned Snorkack came to life, springing off of its parchment, and devouring her alive in less than two bites.

Hagrid, mauled by the somehow angered thestrals that hae had trained and cared for for so many years. Professor McGonagall, forcefully transformed into her feline animagus and locked in a cage with a powerful anti-restoration charm cast upon her, left for days until starvation finally won the battle of her will. Professor Snape, found in his dungeon classroom with his head bent low into a rusty-looking cauldron, had died painfully, the flesh of his face eaten away by the corrosive mixture of several of his potions.

Even Draco Malfoy fell victim to the string of murders, the fatal incantation muttered by his own father.

Hedwig clicked her beak sadly, her eyes roaming once more over the grounds surrounding her. Numerous tombstones, cold and gray, several of them becoming covered in moss, liked the small cemetary. None of them were marked with names, yet she knew exactly who each one belonged to, and delivered every one of Harry's letters to it's rightful owner, never to be read by the bodies that lay below, though that fact was unknown to the writer.

As evil as he was, Voldemort was no fool. He knew that letting Harry know what had become of his loved ones would bring a pain that would eventually fade, while letting the boy continue to believe that they all lived on in a freedom that Harry himself would never know again would give him the useless hope for future peace, a hope that Voldemort delighted in crushing a little more each day.

Leaning down to peck at the threads that tied the parchment to her leg, Hedwig let the latest letter drop to the ground before the former headmaster's grave.

Dumbledore. Voldemort had killed him personally, in a manner so terrible that it made Hedwig shudder just to think about it.

Hooting dolefully, she looked around at the thousands of unopened parchments, and ruffled what remained of her feathers before spreading her wings and taking flight. She was getting old, she knew she didn't have much more time left of her life, and it hurt her to think of what would happen to Harry once she was no longer around to deliver his posts.

For the time being, for all the time she did have left, she would never fail him. She would never deny him the one last shred of hope that he held in his heart, false though it may be.

Letting the wind carry her, Hedwig turned left and made her way toward the former prison, Azkaban, where years before, the dementors that stood guard turned their loyalties elsewhere, and released all of the criminals inside...Where the most feared dark wizard of many ages and his faithful servants took their residency...And where, in a tiny cell, Harry Potter spent the rest of his days as a prisoner to the evil pleasures of his life's mortal enemy, blissfully - tragically - unaware of the world he knew no more.

FIN

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***Note: I actually wrote this FF back in 2005, and originally posted it on a 'Harry Potter' FF forum; following that site's guidelines, though, it was taken down after a couple of months, and hasn't been posted anywhere since...I'm happy to have shared it again =)**

**Now...I realize the descriptions of the deaths of the Order members and Harry's friends were brief and to-the-point -- I wrote them that way intentionally. Why? Well, for one thing, that section is written as it follows Hedwig and her thoughts. Hedwig, being Harry's owl, had no emotional ties to any of the others; she isn't so concerned about _how_ they died, but that the fact that they're gone effects Harry in this way. Also, the focus of this story is Harry, and his personal torment; it's written in a way that, should someone who had never read 'HP' before come across this, they would form an emotional connection with Harry himself, and therefore realize the impact it would have on him to discover people he cared so much about were gone -- not so much the way they had met their ends, but the fact that they were gone in general...And, of course, all of these deaths occured fairly simultaneously, and very quickly, so there isn't much else to describe about each one, other than a brief "house collapsed" or "a flash of green light"...No one got to play hero because, to be frank, no one had the time to react.**

**To sum it up, I went with the power of harsh "reality" when it came to explaining the world outside of Harry's cell, and why he was getting no responses, rather than trying to fluff and sugarcoat it with long, intricate death scenes for each person. Sometimes, the stark truth can be more unsettling than the description...**

**I really appreciate all of the reviews I've gotten so far (even the very few that were just plain insulting without offering any sort of constructive criticism), and I look forward to receiving more -- you all are the ones I write for, I want to make my readers happy!**

**I hope you enjoyed...It was sad, I know, but also a very real possibility for an alternate ending, no? Thanks for reading! ~ SP**


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